Cold
by Versk
Summary: When Tobi catches a cold, he's not the only one who suffers. To what length will Deidara go to stop the incessant coughing? DeiTobi


**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto. Naruto and all its affiliations (including, but not limited to: its characters, objects, places and events) are owned by Masashi Kishimoto.

**Author's Note:** I guess this is a gift for those still waiting on the next chapter of "Memories." Inspired by my brother who caught a cold while cosplaying as Tobi.

* * *

It started with a sniffle. At first he did not think much of it—they were traveling in the mountainous, damp regions of the continent after all. But after the second, third, and seventh time, it became obvious this was more than just a fluke. It was a cold waiting to manifest.

The remainder of the day saw the symptoms worsen. What was once just a simple inward breath turned monstrous to keep a flood of mucus from spilling out. Each time he committed the disgusting ritual, the blond accompanying him reacted by either shivering and ignoring it, or casting the masked man a most revolted glare.

Each time Tobi apologized, giving some sort of excuse to deter the other from believing he was catching some kind of contagion. It was due to the weather, the long hours of travel, or just spontaneous. Deidara played along, and acted like he believed the raven-haired man. But excuses were harder to come by as, the next day, Tobi started coughing.

Like the bouts of sniffles, the coughs came erratically and spread throughout the day so that when the next cough came, the previous had already been forgotten. But as the day wore on, and tomorrow started to rise, the mild coughs turned hoarse and ferocious. At times Tobi even had to stop while he expelled the congestion stuck in his throat and lungs. It was tiring and irksome to both Akatsuki. Tobi apologized to Deidara, reassuring him he was fine.

The blond rolled his eyes in response, pulling a frown at the corner of his mouth and crossing his arms. "It's just something in the air! I swear!" Tobi exclaimed as Deidara muttered how foolish and idiotic the raven-haired man could be.

Deidara ignored the excuse and started up again, leaving Tobi in the dust. Tobi frowned behind his mask, his black brow knitted in self-hatred. If there was one thing the masked man loathed most, it was disdain. Scorn from any person was equal in measure to any pain, however mild or harsh. It made him feel like an outcast, made him feel alone.

So when the blond scoffed at his evident sickness, Tobi's insides churned with regret and guilt. Having the one he cherished—as a senior, teacher, and friend—look at him with such disgust was like being stabbed. All Tobi wanted was acceptance.

He could barely keep up with Deidara for the next couple days. Though the blond did stop and wait for Tobi to catch up, he always remained a few yards ahead as they traveled. Tobi guessed the reason was to keep from catching whatever Tobi had. His perfection could not be damaged by a cold. He'd never allow that sort of thing to happen willingly.

When at last the fifth day of Tobi's ailment was coming to an end, the sun setting in an explosion of color over the horizon, Tobi was near the breaking point. His throat felt like someone had forced a shuriken down it, his limbs sat sore and lifeless, and his mouth felt bone-dry despite the endless amount of nasal fluid he had to sniff up.

The inside of his mask, should someone have gotten close enough to it, was in terrible shape. It was disgustingly damp and smelled almost like vomit despite the wearer never having.

Even with the mask hiding his facial features, Tobi looked a mess. His body language screamed sickness as he sat before the smoking fire, back bent awkwardly and head low, hair in disarray and arms stiff as, with one hand, he prodded the thick logs with a thin stick. He had to be careful as he played with the flames. Should he use too much force the stick would break or the logs would collapse onto one another, sending up a wave of heat and smoke right into his face; yet he could not be too weak or else what would be the point of such a chancy game.

He snorted like a troll as he sat, the noise going all around the campsite.

Just as Tobi was sure he could move a log without incident, he found himself face-to-face with the flames and rising smoke. "Sure you should be so close, un?"

The irritating heat and smoke wafted through the mask's one eyehole and sent Tobi on a coughing spree. The sound he made was reminiscent to an old dog, deep and throaty yet coarse. Deidara removed his foot from the taller man's back only after, between gasps, he'd been begged to.

Tobi reeled back, clutching his throat and lifting his face toward the clean sky. "Idiot!" he heard Deidara mutter. The blond took a seat perpendicular to him as he calmed.

Deidara sat cross-legged, staring at Tobi with one blue eye shimmering in the flickering light of the fire. He had his face propped up in one hand, elbow digging into his thigh. At this angle it was easy to see the contempt growing in his slanted eyes.

"You should do something about that cough, un," said Deidara conversationally. Tobi merely nodded but almost imperceptibly—not that Deidara was watching. The blond had his eyes on the fire.

Sleep is never easy when one has a cold. And Tobi was no exception to this fact. As he lay in his sleeping bag an hour or two after being thrust into the fire—now smoldering—by Deidara, Tobi caught sudden fits of coughing, wheezing, and sniffling. It was miserable.

He sounded more like a dog than a person now, his coughs taking hold of him every few hours, minutes, seconds, disrupting his sleep. Each time he came close enough to slumber to be on the edge of a dream, a small twitch in his throat woke him and sent him barking again into his sleeping bag. A groan would rise in reply, always going over the volume of Tobi's throaty coughs. If he could muster speech after the tirade, he apologized.

All through the night Tobi continued to cough and sneeze and sniffle, each time disrupting his own sleep and the sleep of his partner. And each time Deidara would confirm his annoyance with a groan.

In the early hours of the morning—or late hours of the night—Tobi found himself in the worst fit he'd had. For what felt like hours he was caught in a storm of gurgling wheezes and coughs, snorts and gasps. When at last it ended the formerly masked man—he found it much easier to breath with his mask off—opened his mouth to apologize for the umpteenth time that night. But the vibration of his vocal chords set him off again and he could not speak clearly for a minute or two.

Halfway through the coughing Tobi came to notice something. Despite the loud noises he had not yet heard any grumbling.

At first he supposed Deidara had finally fallen asleep. But, considering the situation further, it seemed less likely _anyone _would be able to sleep through such a ruckus. Carefully moving out of his sleeping bag, Tobi put on his mask and crawled his way over to where Deidara's bag lay. It was farther away than when they'd first settled down; at least four times the distance.

When Tobi finally reached the lumpy form in the pitch darkness, he found the bag empty. Panic struck him, sending his heart racing. He could feel it, another tickling sensation in his throat. Shutting his mouth tightly and refusing to breath, Tobi continued to search the bag for any sign of the blond, even turning the bag upside down and shaking it. All that fell out was lint and balls of dried clay.

Even as he suffered from another fit of coughing and gasping Tobi searched the campsite. He searched everywhere around the perimeter of the site but found no trace of the Iwa-nin. Not a note, not a hair, not anything.

The dark air gave rise to horrible imaginings. Maybe Deidara had been kidnapped! If he was, then the kidnappers were sure to question him about Akatsuki. But, knowing his sempai, he'd never give in. The kidnappers would have to torture the information out of him. He could see it:

Deidara sat on a lone, armless chair underneath the only light source in the room. He was stripped of his cloak and his clay and his disheveled hair fell before his face, undone. Head hanging low he refrained from speaking to the faceless men standing about him. Deidara shook his head in answer to whatever question they posed him.

Tobi shook his head violently, managing to hold off from sputtering. He had to get those thoughts out of his mind! Deidara was strong; he'd never let anyone take him so easily.

But then where was he?

Too absorbed in worry and his own thought, Tobi never noticed the presence slowly approaching him until a hand rested itself on his shoulder.

Without even realizing it himself, Tobi reacted. In less than a second he had the trespasser pinned to the ground, a kunai at his throat. The sudden burst of action brought another tickle to the raven-haired's throat but he managed to keep it in, pressing his lips firmly together.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, idiot?" Suddenly, without even being able to see, he knew the trespasser's exact identity. A firm kick to the chest, sending him flying, confirmed his suspicions.

"Sempai!" Tobi finished the word with a throaty cough.

As soon as he looked up from the small fit, something was thrust in front of him. It was a vile from what he could tell, and what he read on the label (using his sharingan eye to see) made him cringe.

"It's cold medicine," Deidara confirmed, shaking it slightly so the liquid inside churned.

"…ew," was all that came from Tobi's mouth.

"Ew?" Deidara repeated, obviously not too pleased with such a response. He looked from the bottle in his hand to Tobi's orange mask and back. "It's cherry flavored. Now take it!"

Tobi made a disgusted noise. "That just makes it worse."

"What are you talking about, un?" came Deidara's annoyed response. "I thought you _liked _cherry."

"I do but not in medicine. It just makes it taste worse than the original!"

Deidara growled. "Listen," he began, "I've had enough of your constant coughing. Do you have any idea what I had to go through to get this? I had to travel to three different villages, in the dead of night, without my cloak, risking capture just to get this damn thing, un."

It touched him to think Deidara had done all this just for him. But thinking about it further, it seemed more like just a plot so _he _could sleep well. Whatever the reason, Tobi jerked his head to the side, crossed his arms, and uttered, "Make me!"

The flames of hate were almost visible as they rose from the blond. "Fine!"

Before Tobi could scuttle away Deidara was in front of him, kneeling between the shinobi's legs. From what he could read in the dark, the vile said to give the patient two full bottle caps worth of medicine. Rather clumsily Deidara poured the red and sticky contents into the cap. Most of it spilled onto the ground.

"Take it, un!" he yelled, thrusting the cap toward the mask.

With a wave of his hand Tobi sent the cap flying off to the side. Its contents spilled onto the ground, collecting bits of sand and small rocks into sticky globes. Both shinobi simply stared in awe for a moment.

"Ha ha! Now I can't take the dumb medicine!" Tobi mocked. "Erm…sempai? Sempai?"

He could feel the blond shaking with rage, but he still hadn't made a move.

Suddenly Deidara lifted the bottle to his mouth and downed half of its contents. The act stunned Tobi, and in his stupor he was unable to react as Deidara, medicine spilling out of the corner of his mouth, lifted up Tobi's mask and pressed their lips together.

Deidara's powerful tongue managed to part Tobi's lips, sending the flood of medicine into the other's mouth. With the only exit now blocked there was no where else for the foul-tasting medicine to go but down. Thankfully Tobi did not have to relish in its horrible taste for long.

After Tobi gulped the stuff down Deidara captured his tongue in a twisted dance. It preoccupied his mind, drifting him away from the tangy taste of medicine and toward the sweet taste of the blond.

In an attempt to deepen the kiss further, the tip of Deidara's tongue accidentally brushed against a sensitive part Tobi's throat. A cough sent the artist reeling back. Both of them went into a fit.

When it finally subsided Tobi pulled his mask back down and found Deidara staring at him sidelong, whipping his dribbling mouth with a black sleeve.

For a moment they just sat there, staring at each other, until Deidara shifted and their positions became evident. Deidara let out a low growl, realizing himself to be sitting in Tobi's bent lap. Apparently neither noticed him crawling on during the medicinal "exchange."

Casually, Deidara stood up from where he sat straddling Tobi's waist and stepped away. He turned his back on Tobi to stare at the rising sun. Had they really been going at it that long?

The artist turned his head just enough to catch Tobi in the corner of his vision. "We should probably get going, un," he said. "It won't be long before someone recognizes who I was and sends a squad to find us."

Tobi nodded in agreement and scrambled to start picking up. He found the cap to the medicine covered in dirt thanks to the stickiness of the cold remedy. He washed it off in the nearby river and recapped the bottle, then proceeded to packing up everything else.

The next day, as they set out, Deidara let out a rough cough. Unlucky for Tobi, however, the blond was not as unwilling to take the medicine as he had been.


End file.
